Mystical Beginnings
by Sera1
Summary: Slightly dark in beginning, also action/adventure. Voldemort captures Harry, and it turns out Harry's not human. Harry is changed to his true form, and excapes. H/H, rated so far cause of Harry's mouth. Me bad at summaries. Chap 2 up.
1. Capture, and Harry has a Potty Mouth

Firethroat: We no own Harry Potter, you no sue.

Me: Though I wouldn't say no to Sirius.

Vurso: Oh, no. Tie her down before she goes crazy.

Firethroat: Yeah. We don't want a repeat of the Sesshoumaru incident… don't ask, don't ask.

Both: *Tie me down. *

Me: How is the story going to get written if I can't move?

Vurso: You have it written down in your composition book. I'll just type it out.

Me: Curses. Foiled again!

Firethroat: Mental note… keep her away from the Xanth books for a while, too. (Which we also do not own)

Vurso: *Grabs the book, sits down, and starts typing. * On with the fic.

*********************

"Master, we have finally captured the boy. He is being held in the fourth floor dungeon." A thin, greedy voice rose out of the darkness. The only light came from a small, sputtering candle that was close to extinguishing itself with its own wax. The flickering reflected eerily on a hand made of molten silver.

"Excellent. You have finally proven your little worth, Wormtail. For pleasing me, I shall spare your life. Now get out of my sight." Red eyes glowed slightly to emphasize the threat.

"Yes Master." A small pop, and a scruffy rat scurried away hurriedly, not wanting to give his master a reason to use him for McGonagell bait.

"Ahh… finally, I have you in my grasp, Potter. And you shall find that I can squeeze rather hard…" Maniacle laughter filled the complex, making all of the occupants, save one, quiver in fear.

In the dungeons, a sixteen year old boy was slumped where he was chained to the wall. He was lanky, with the toned muscles he had filled with a wiry strength. Emerald eyes peered out from under a shock of unruly black hair, and a lightning bolt shaped scar burned against his forehead.

The boy's robes were tattered, and hung loosely against his frame. They did almost nothing to ward off the searing cold that swept in from the high, barred window. A snarl formed his mouth, and a low, terrifying growl burned from his throat. At that point, if you looked closely, you could almost sense another creature peering out from behind his eyes.

The soft growl grew louder as Lord Voldemort, killer of muggles, muggle-borns, and wizards and witches alike, and mad-man extraordinaire, stepped through the heavy metal door, his heavy robes swirling about his ankles. The scar on Harry's forehead was glowing at this point, and small tremors of pain traveled up and down his spine. He strained at his bonds, his hands just itching to close around the throat of his mortal enemy. So what if he died? If he could take Voldemort with him, he would die happy.

The evil genius in question smirked. "So you wish for my death, eh, Harry? Bah!" He scoffed. "You won't be the first, or the last, to want me dead." Harry strained harder to free himself.

Voldemort's tone took on an ominous quality as he changed the subject. "Did you ever wonder why I wanted you dead in the first place, Harry?" The boy in question stopped struggling, surprised at this turn of events.

"Cause you're a heartless bastard that enjoys seeing people, especially little kids, cry in pain?" Harry quipped with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, yes, but that's not why specifically." Voldemort replied calmly. "You see, Harry, it was prophecized that not a human, but a magical creature would be my downfall. When Dumbledor discovered that it was you, he transformed you into a human baby, and placed you in the Potters' care. It took me months to track you down, and it turns out that the prophecy was partially correct."

Voldemort allowed an evil smirk to travel across his face. "In fact, I have ordered my faithful servant, Severus, to concoct a potion to change you back to your true form, as I am particuarly curious as to what I am facing." He turned, and with a swirl of his cloak, walked out of the room.

A few minutes later, a man that Harry recognised as his Professor walked in, carrying a vial of dark, sludgy liquid in it. As he tipped it to the boy's lips, he muttered under his breath, "I altered the potion so that you will keep your mind and memories. Just remember to act as vicious as you can, kid." With that, he poured the foul tasting potion down Harry's throat.

As the changes coursed through his body, followed by a wave of pain that rivalled the Cruciatious Curse, only one thought managed to make its way through the fog clouding his brain: _What am I?_

And then there was darkness.

*********************

Vurso: *Smiles. * I love it when she leaves cliffies. Though I know we'll get death threats for this.

Firethroat: Better go get the fire burning to get rid of all of 'em. At least we'll be warm for a while.

Vurso: You're a Charizard… you have a built in flame on your tail… YOU'RE ALWAYS WARM!!

Firethroat: Oh yeah.

Me: You guys gonne untie me now? I'm better.

Firethroat: Fine. *Unties me. *

Vurso: *Too late. * No! Don't!

Me: Hahaha!!! I'm free!!!! Here I come, Sirius!!! *Goes to find him. *

Vurso: *Glares at Firethroat. * Now look at what you did.

Firethroat: Uh… I'll just go start the fire… *Dashes out of the room. *

Vurso: *Sighs. * Looks like I'm stuck with damage control… again. *Leaves to go stop me from doing too much emotional damage to Sirius. *

Firethroat: *Pokes his head in for a second. * Please review!


	2. Escape, and smart mouthed wings

Me, Vurso, and Firethroat: *Raise an eyebrow at my new muse. *

Eric (an Umbreon): *Raises an eyebrow in return. *

Me: *Suddenly rushes forward and glomps him. * KAWAII!!

All three: *Sweatdrop. *

Firethroat: Anyways, we don't own Harry Potter.

Eric: *Turning blue under his fur. * Uh… little help?

Vurso: Eh, you get used to it.

Eric: *Gasping for air. *

Vurso: *Sighs as he prys me off of him. * Anyways, on with the fic.

*********************

Harry groaned as he slowly opened his eyes. Everything was bleary and seemed strangely out of focus. And everything was much too bright. With a small hiss of pain, he closed his eyes again. A migraine was slowly working its way from his temples to his forehead, but it was one of those that when it got there, it hit with enough force to knock over Hagrid.

__

What hit me? He thought to himself.

__

And for that matter, where am I? It's cramped in here. Very cramped, actually. He had a huge crick in his neck, he felt like his back would ache forever, and his tail was scrunched up right next to his front feet.

Wait… tail…?

Everyone in Voldemort's base jumped in surprise and a little fear at the bellow that came from the fourth floor dungeons.

***

Harry's eyes were wide open now, and he was anxiously looking himself over. Of course, it was impeded by the large, ebony snout that took up most of the bottom half of his vision. (Firethroat: Welcome to our world, Harry.)

__

Oh shit. He cursed mentally. There was no doubt as to what he was. The long, sinuous tail. The obsidan scales over most of his body, with emerald on his underside. The huge, leathery wings. The large fangs in his mouth. The razor sharp claws. The better senses. The long neck and slim body.

Harry Potter was a dragon.

He didn't recognize the species, though. Nowhere had he read of black dragons with green undersides. Either he was the only one of his kind, or his species of dragon was very rare.

Neither one was good. As a dragon, and because he was Harry Potter, he had little enough chance to get out of there as it was. If he were rare or one of a kind, chances of escape were practically nonexistent.

Another once over made Harry realize that he now also didn't have any clothes. Not surpsising, since they would have ripped when he grew to the size he was now. He wasn't too worried, though. His scales covered the essentials, but it felt weird to not have clothes on.

The lack of clothes led him to realize that he wasn't cold anymore. Apparently his scales acted as insulation. He was pretty warm.

Another feeling was starting to assert itself. Unfortunately, no human had ever discovered that dragons were very claustrophobic. And Harry was no different.

__

Need… out… too… cramped… Harry started thrashing about, the coils of his body striking against the stone walls.

Another thing about dragons that Harry discovered right then and there. They are much, much stronger than they look. And that's saying something.

Harry blinked as one of the walls crumbled under his assault. A slow grin found its way to his snout, and he suddenly rushed forward, slamming his shoulder into the next wall, and bursting through it.

Another thing about dragons. They were very fast. VERY fast. Harry had burst through ten walls in as many seconds before he reached the outside. Of course, being the lunkhead he was, he had gone the long way, all the way through the base, when right behind him had been an outside wall. What can I say, Harry isn't the brightest of people, and he felt a need to destroy things, anyways. Blame it on the dragon brain. (Vurso and Firethroat: HEY!)

Harry blinked and rubbed at his eyes with a forepaw. The sudden brightness of the sun hurt, especially to his now very sensitive eyes.

He felt a funny sensation, as if a Nerf ball were thrown hard at him and bounced off. He opened his eyes slightly, and peered from the tiny slits.

A bunch of Death Eaters were gathered around him, and all of them were hurling spells at him. The amusing part was that the spells kept rebounding and hitting the Death Eaters, and knocking them out. In fact, if he just stayed there, they probably would eventually just all knock themselves out.

Course, he didn't have that kind of time. With a large swipe of his tail, he knocked them all into a wall.

__

Now, time to see if these wings work. With that thought, Harry gathered his muscular hind legs under himself, and arched his back. With a might surge, he leapt into the air, and spread his wings.

He immediately found out that flying is definitely NOT as easy as it looks. (Vurso: We could have told him that.) Winds buffeted him, and he had to flap a lot to stay airborne over the water he found himself flying over. He looked back, and recognized Azkaban from pictures. _So that's where I am…_

Harry's wings were on fire (not literally, mind you) by the time he made it to land a couple miles away. He also learned that landings aren't as easy as they look, either, when he got a snoutful of dirt.

After spitting and sneezing most of it out, he slowly dragged himself to his feet. He folded his aching wings, which protested at any movement. Very loudly, in fact.

"Oh, shut up" Harry grumbled. "I'm too tired to listen to this crap."

The wings cowered at their owner's harsh words, and decided to keep shut. Much safer than trying to back-talk a pissed off dragon. (Firethroat: *Preens. * Me: Don't flatter yourself. Firethroat: *Pouts. *)

Harry slowly dragged himself forward, not even thinking about how he easily fell into the smooth, graceful amble of a dragon. It was getting him somewhere, so he didn't care.

He had apparently landed on the edge of the Forbidden Forest. (I don't know if Azkaban is near the Forbidden Forest, so I say it is. So there.) After walking for quite a few hours, the sun was starting to set. He had apparently been out for a while.

Finally feeling that he was far enough away to be somewhat safe, he tiredly coiled himself around a huge tree. Laying the tip of his tail over his nose, he tried to sleep.

Tired as he was, Harry just couldn't get to sleep. His thoughts drifted back to his friends.

__

They're all probably worried sick… He sighed sadly. _Worst of all, I didn't even get it…_

The reason that Harry had been captured was simple: Hermione was sick. Very sick. Snape had managed to mix up a potion that would cure her, but it was missing one very rare ingredient.

Gryphon's blood.

Harry, being the idiot that he is, decided to go into the Forbidden forest to find a gryphon and get some. At night.

Of course he got caught. I mean, he was practically asking for it.

And now he was stuck as a dragon, in the middle of the most dangerous forest on earth.

"Things can't get any worse…" He muttered, it coming out as a low growl.

And, of course, whenever you say those words, the Irony Gods always find a way to make it worse.

A crack of thunder, and the previously perfectly clear sky now suddenly was covered in dark clouds, and pouring down icy rain.

Harry groaned as he closed his eyes and slowly fell into a fitful sleep.

The lesson today, kids: Never, ever, EVER say "It can't get any worse." Because it always will.

*********************

Eric: What do you think? Good first day on the job?

Vurso: Uh…

Firethroat: *Growls. * HE DID A BETTER JOB THAN US!!!!

Me: AT LEAST HE ACTUALLY DID HIS JOB!!!

Firethroat: Uh… no comment.

Vurso: Anyways… please review… *Starts conspiring with Firethroat to get rid of Eric. *

Me: *Sighs and knocks them both out. * Don't worry. They'll just take a little time to get used to him.

Eric: *Sweatdrops. * Anyways… review, okay?

Me: Eric, we've gotta work on your style and presentation. *Drags him out of the room by the tail *

Eric: *Gulps. *


	3. Harry's starting to hear voices this is ...

Me: Sorry it's been so long, everyone. I have school, you know, and my English teacher just assigned us a 10 - 12 page research paper on an author's life! Come on, no author's life is THAT interesting, to be 10 pages typed!  
  
Vurso: Also, don't forget the MST you did.  
  
Me: Yeah. It took me a week to do it, and ended up being over 10,000 words!  
  
Firethroat: *Snickers* And us muses have had problems of our own... like Vurso, for instance...  
  
Female voice from out of the room: OH VURSO!!!  
  
Vurso: EEP! *Runs*  
  
Eric: *Laughing* That was Inverse, the Charizard muse of another author. In case you haven't noticed, she likes Vurso. A lot.  
  
Firethroat: *Glares at Eric* And we found out that Eric has been hiding something from us...  
  
Eric: It's none of your business if I'm bi.  
  
Firethroat: Yes is it, CAUSE I'M A GUY!!!  
  
Me: *Sighs as my muses keep bickering* And Firethroat has problems, too. A Charizard-anthro has her eye on him, too.  
  
Firethroat: *Looks over his shoulder* I'll just get this over with. We don't own Harry Potter. *Goes back to arguing with Eric*  
  
Vurso: *Pokes his head in* On with the fic.  
  
Inverse (still out of the room): VURSO!  
  
Vurso: Uh-oh, gotta go!  
  
*********************  
  
The first thing Harry noticed when he woke up was that it was cold. He tried to open his eyes, and couldn't. He then tried twitching his tail, and couldn't. This prompted a surge of strength from the young dragon, and he strained, until he heard a huge cracking sound. Suddenly, he was free, and once he had pawed at his face with a forefoot for a bit, he saw the problem. He had been covered in a good layer of ice during the night. Only the fact that he had really hot breath kept his nose from being frozen, and him from suffocating.  
  
After cleaning his scales off, and crunching some of the ice for water, he raised his head on his long neck, and looked around. Forest in all directions.  
  
Harry sighed. This was not going to be fun. Even if he was a distance flyer, which he couldn't do, from lack of practice, he couldn't take off with all the trees around him. He would have to walk.  
  
Another problem was his lack of direction. Dumbledor had tried to teach the students how to sense magical auras, but he had never really gotten the hang of it. Hermione was much better at it.  
  
This provoked a pained feeling in his heart. Here he was, who knows where in the Forbidden Forest, stuck as a dragon, and he didn't even have the Gryphon's blood. He could only hope that she would be okay until he got back... if he got back.  
  
Harry took a few deep, calming breaths, and closed his eyes. Like Dumbledor had instructed, he cleared his mind of all thought, and gently gathered his aura and consciousness together in one large ball. Then, with a mighty mental heave, he tossed it up in the air, and let it spread out as it fell, like a giant magical invisible rain.  
  
His mind cast revealed a lot of things to him. One, no Deatheaters were anywhere nearby, which was good. Two, Hogwarts was a coupla hundred miles away, which was bad. He was also able to check on Hermione's aura, which hadn't faded any. Good ol' Hermione. She was still hanging in there.  
  
He slowly drew his aura and consciousness back into him, which kinda resembled reeling in a fishing line, only from all directions. He breathed a deep sigh of relief once everything was back in place. There was so much that could go wrong with Aura-casting, that Dumbledor had told them to only use it as a last resort. It also left him feeling even more drained, and his stomach protested the fact that it was very, very empty.  
  
Food first. School later. A part of his brain told him. Huh? Was his sentiment.  
  
I'm the dragon part of you, idiot. Now, listen to me, and I'll get something to fill our belly.  
  
Sounds good. What did you have in mind?  
  
He felt his nose twitch, and an unfamiliar scent filled his snout. A grin curved the edges of his mouth. Deer sounds good.  
  
Uh... I don't have to kill it myself, do I?  
  
No one is gonna do it for you. Darnit... well, at least tell me I don't have to eat it raw...  
  
Fine... you can cook it if you want.  
  
Uh... how do I do that?  
  
Harry felt a light mental bonk. Idiot. We're a fire-breathing dragon.  
  
But I don't know HOW to breathe fire!  
  
Harry felt the equivalent of a mental sigh. This may take a while. Might as well explain it all right off, so I don't have to later. Dragons have a special small second stomach, right next to our main one. When we eat sulfur, it goes there. Special acids, liquids, and enzymes are mixed with the sulfur, and the resulting mixture is stored in a small sac nestled between our lungs. When we breathe fire, we translate a lot of heat to our chest, which heats the liquid. It only takes a couple of special breathes to stoke up our fires, as the expression goes. Then, for the next hour, we're ready to breathe fire. To breathe fire, we just release a small amount of the hot liquid into an exhaled breath, and once it touches the oxygen outside our bodies, it erupts into flame. Simple as that.  
  
Oh... so how do I breathe fire again?  
  
Harry felt the mental equivalent of a face-fault, and then a lot of painful mental bonks. Just do what I say!  
  
After a long and exhausting hunting lesson, Harry caught breakfast, roasted it (it came out nicely burned), and chowed down. Resisting the urge to curl up and take a nap, the tired dragon continued on his weary way.  
  
*********************  
  
Me: *Laughing* Poor Harry... now he's starting to hear voices in his head. And he's STILL not any closer to Hogwarts.  
  
Firethroat and Eric: *Still at it.*  
  
Me: Right... Oh well, please review. And another chapter might not be up for a while... like I said, research report.  
  
Vurso: *Runs past with a Charizard hot on his heels*  
  
Me: *Sweatdrops* Vurso... YOU CAN FLY!!!  
  
Vurso: Oh yeah! *Takes off and outflys her*  
  
Inverse: Dangit.. 


End file.
